Getty Center Los Angeles: Tickets, Hours and Parking

Admission to the Getty Center is free, but you need a free timed-entry reservation to get in, and parking costs $25 (about €22, £18) per car or motorcycle. Those two facts decide most of the planning. Everything else about a visit is easy: the museum sits on a hilltop in the Santa Monica Mountains, and a driverless tram carries you up from the car park at no charge.

If you have never been, the arrival is disorienting in a good way. You drive up to the parking structure and there is no museum in sight. You leave the car, ride the tram out of the trees, and the campus appears above you in white metal and honey-coloured stone. It raised my expectations, and the visit met them. This guide covers what has changed since, because the ticketing, the parking price and a chunk of the galleries are not what they were. It pairs well with a longer week in Los Angeles.

Getty Center tickets, hours and parking

Admission and reservations

Admission to the Getty Center is free and always has been, but since the museum moved to timed entry you cannot simply turn up. Reserve a free entry time online at getty.edu or by calling (310) 440-7300, and check your spam folder for the confirmation, which comes from tickets@ticketing.getty.edu. Same-day slots are sometimes available, so a last-minute plan is not hopeless.

Parking is the only thing you pay for, and no reservation is needed or accepted for it. If you have to cancel your entry time, email visitor services with the subject line “Cancel” and your order number, or call the same number.

Opening hours

The Getty Center opens six days a week and closes on Mondays. The hours are listed below.

The museum also closes on New Year’s Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day, and it closes early on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. Saturday evening is the quiet, beautiful slot: the galleries stay open until 9pm, the city lights come on below the garden, and parking after 6pm is free.

Parking at the Getty Center

Parking is $25 (about €22, £18) per car or motorcycle, dropping to $15 (about €13, £11) after 3pm and $10 (about €9, £7) after 6pm, and it is free on Saturdays after 6pm. The Getty has gone cashless, so bring a card. Pay by scanning the QR code on your parking ticket, or at the machines by the lifts on every level of the main structure and near the tram station at the top.

Two things save money. Active and veteran United States military service members park free from Memorial Day weekend to Veterans Day, on production of a valid military ID at the Information Desk in the Museum Entrance Hall or at the Parking Office on level T1. And the Pay Once, Park Twice deal covers same-day parking at both the Getty Center and the Getty Villa Museum for a single fee: reserve entry to both sites for the same date, then ask at the Museum Information Desk of whichever you visit first for a coupon. It is not valid on Mondays or Tuesdays, and driving between the two takes 20 to 45 minutes.

There is no street parking near the Getty Center and the surrounding neighbourhoods are restricted, so the structure is the only option. Bicycles park free at racks on the entry level, electric vehicle chargers sit at the north end on levels P2, P5, P6 and P7, and there is no phone signal inside the garage.

Getting there without a car

Metro bus line 761 stops at the Getty Center entrance at the junction of Getty Center Drive and Sepulveda Boulevard, and Metro’s trip planner or (323) 466-3876 will confirm times. Cars and vans carrying 15 people or fewer can drop passengers at a turnaround area before the parking structure, which is where a Lyft or an Uber will leave you, and pick-ups happen in the same place. There is a taxi stop on level P1 with direct phone lines to licensed cab companies.

Set your GPS to the junction of N Sepulveda Blvd and Getty Center Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90049 rather than to the postal address, because some devices send drivers to the wrong side of the hill. The official address, 1200 Getty Center Drive, is the one to quote to a taxi driver. Caltrans is running a lane rehabilitation project on the I-405 through the Sepulveda Pass, so check current road conditions before you set off.

What the Getty Center is

The Getty Center is the larger of Getty’s two Los Angeles museums, holding European and American art from the Middle Ages to the present day. The Getty Center opened in December 1997 in Brentwood, and Richard Meier designed it around a central arrival plaza clad in 1.2 million square feet of Italian travertine, 16,000 tons of stone quarried at Bagni di Tivoli outside Rome. The colour shifts through the day, sharp and reflective in the morning, warm by late afternoon.

J. Paul Getty started all of this in a ranch house. He set up the J. Paul Getty Museum Trust in 1953 and turned part of his Pacific Palisades ranch house into a public museum in 1954. When the collection outgrew the house, he began building a replica of an ancient Roman villa on the same property in 1968, and that building, the Getty Villa, opened in 1974. Getty died in 1976 and left the trust nearly $700 million, which paid for the research institute, the conservation institute, the foundation and eventually the hilltop campus itself. Antiquities stayed at the Villa; everything else moved to the Center.

What a visit is like

The Getty Center is not one building but a set of linked pavilions around a plaza, so you can walk from one to the next without going outside. The Getty Center’s paintings galleries sit on the upper level of the North, South, East and West Pavilions and are lit by daylight through a computer-controlled system of louvres, which is why the rooms feel nothing like a strip-lit gallery.

The Central Garden is small and the point of it is the view. From the terraces you look out over the whole basin, from the Pacific to the San Gabriel Mountains, and the tram ride up only hints at it. What I liked most was the range: photography, decorative arts, paintings and sculpture in one afternoon, laid out so you never had to work out where to go next. Exhibitions rotate often, which is a reason to come back rather than to tick it off. On our visit the show was the character heads of Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, with a screen where you sat and tried to copy the grimaces while a camera photographed you failing. The programme running now, Instante/revelación: Moments in Mexican Photography, is on until 3 January 2027.

The shop is worth ten minutes. I bought a handbook of the Getty collections there, did not open it for a year, and still keep it where I can see it. We only had two hours because we went in the early evening before dinner, and that was not enough.

Galleries closed for renovation

Part of the museum is shut while work goes on, and it is a substantial part. South Pavilion galleries 101, 102 and 206, West Pavilion galleries 102 and 103, and all of the East and North Pavilion galleries are closed for renovations. Check what is on view before you drive up if there is a specific painting you are coming for, because the closure covers whole pavilions rather than a room here and there.

Where to stay near the Getty Center

Nothing sits at the foot of the hill, so “near the Getty” in Los Angeles means a 10 to 15 minute drive. Three that work are listed below, running from design hotel to motel.

Hotel 850 SVB, West Hollywood is the property this page used to list as the 850 Hotel; it now trades under that name as a member of Design Hotels. It is on the edge of the Sunset Strip, about 15 minutes’ drive from the Getty Center, with a terrace, room service, laundry, a 24-hour front desk and a continental breakfast. Guests score its location 9.4 and mention how quiet the rooms are for a main road. Rates for Hotel 850 SVB reflect the address.

Gateway Hotel Santa Monica sits on Santa Monica Boulevard, under 15 minutes from the Getty and a short bus ride from the beach. Rooms have air conditioning, a flat-screen TV, a desk, a fridge and a coffee maker, and there is a fitness centre, a terrace, free Wi-Fi and on-site private parking. Guests rate the location 8.6 and the parking gets a specific mention, which in this city counts. Check dates for Gateway Hotel Santa Monica if you want to combine the museum with the beach.

Wilshire Motel is about 10 minutes’ drive from the Getty Center and is the cheap, straightforward option. Rooms are air-conditioned with a flat-screen TV and a hairdryer, Wi-Fi is free, parking is free on site and the front desk is staffed around the clock. It scores 9.0 for location, and guests keep singling out the staff. Look at Wilshire Motel if the budget is going on the rest of the trip.

For an apartment instead of a hotel, which usually works out better for a family or a stay over four nights, search Los Angeles listings on Vrbo.

How to get to Los Angeles

I flew from Brussels to LAX via New York JFK and hired a car for the whole trip, which is the right call for the Getty because the museum is 20 minutes off the 405 and awkward on transit. Fares to LAX swing hard by day of the week, so run your dates through Trip.com’s Los Angeles routes before you fix them.

A car also unlocks the coast, the canyons and the Villa in the same week. Compare what the depots at LAX are charging on DiscoverCars, and book early for an automatic in summer, when the cheap categories go first.

Getty Center questions

Is the Getty Center free? Yes. Admission is free for everyone and always has been. You still need a free timed-entry reservation, and parking costs $25 (about €22, £18), less after 3pm and 6pm.

How long do you need at the Getty Center? Allow three hours for the galleries, the Central Garden and the views. Two hours is enough for a first pass but you will leave things out, which is what happened to us.

Is the Getty Center the same as the Getty Villa? No. They are two separate museums about 13 miles (20.9 km) apart. The Getty Center in Brentwood holds European and American art from the Middle Ages onwards; the Getty Villa Museum at 17985 Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades holds Greek and Roman antiquities and opens daily 10am to 5pm, closed Tuesdays. Both are free and both need a timed-entry reservation.

Can you visit the Getty Center on a Monday? No. The Getty Center is closed on Mondays, and the Pay Once, Park Twice parking deal does not run on Mondays or Tuesdays either.

Do you have to pay for the tram? No. The tram from the parking structure to the hilltop campus is included, runs on its own without a driver, and takes a few minutes. You can walk up instead if you would rather.

WonderfulWanderings Pro Tips

The 5 tips below come from my own visit and from re-checking the Getty’s own ticketing, hours and closures in 2026.

1. Reserve a timed-entry slot before you drive up. Admission is free and the reservation is not optional, so a guide that lists only “free entry” is enough to get you turned around at the gate.
2. Aim for a Saturday evening. The Getty stays open until 9pm on Saturdays, against 6:30pm from Tuesday to Friday and on Sunday, it is closed all day Monday, and parking is free on Saturdays after 6pm.
3. Bring a card, because the car park has gone cashless. Parking costs $25 (about €22, £18) per car or motorcycle, falling to $15 (about €13, £11) after 3pm and $10 (about €9, £7) after 6pm. Pay by scanning the QR code on the ticket, or at the machines by the lifts and near the tram station.
4. Check the closure list if you are coming for one particular work. South Pavilion galleries 101, 102 and 206, West Pavilion galleries 102 and 103 and every East and North Pavilion gallery are shut for renovation, which is whole pavilions rather than a room here and there, and the list keeps changing.
5. Give it 3 hours rather than the 2 we had. We came in the early evening before dinner and saw photography, decorative arts, paintings and sculpture, but left plenty out, including proper time on the Central Garden terraces where the view runs from the Pacific to the San Gabriel Mountains.

About the author. This guide is written and maintained by the Wonderful Wanderings editorial team. Wonderful Wanderings was founded in 2012 by Sofie Couwenbergh, and the first-hand notes in this post come from her own visit to the Getty Center in Los Angeles. The team covers the United States for independent travellers, including the museums, hotels and car hire worth booking around Los Angeles, and updates this page when hours, parking fees and ticketing rules change.